Maurice Sendak, 1928-2012

As you have no doubt heard by now, the great Maurice Sendak passed away
early this morning at the age of 83. Like most people of my generation,
I've long had fond memories of Sendak's Where the Wild Things
Are, but it wasn't until this past year, when I began reading it
aloud to my daughter, that I finally understood just what a
multilayered accomplishment it is.

I say "began" reading it aloud, because once wasn't enough, of course.
My daughter requested it over and over for days, and it soon entered our
regular bedtime reading rotation, as did many of Sendak's other works,
from the Little Bear stories that he only illustrated to the four
tiny child-size volumes in his Nutshell Library.

The outpouring of emotion in response to Sendak's death has been
immediate and intense, as is only natural given his great influence on
so many people's formative imaginations. His most famous book, Where
the Wild Things Are, is the title most often being cited today, and
it may indeed be his most perfect story. As his former editor Ursula
Nordstrom wrote back in 1964, "I think
Wild Things is the first complete work of art in the picture book
field, conceived, written, illustrated, executed in entirety by one
person of authentic genius." She went on: "Most books are written from
the outside in. But Wild Things comes from the inside out, if you
know what I mean."

But while Wild Things was Sendak's breakthrough book, it would
be a shame if readers overlooked his later masterpieces, including not
just In the Night Kitchen, a Freudian update of Winsor McCay's
Little Nemo in Slumberland, but also the emotionally
shattering Outside Over There, in which a young girl's baby
sister is kidnapped by goblins (who resemble human infants
themselves).

"Herman Melville said that artists have to take a dive, and either you
hit your head on a rock and you split your skull and you die, or that
blow to the head is so inspiring that you come back up and do the best
work you ever did," Sendak said in an interview late last year. "But you have to
take the dive, and you do not know what the result will be." Creating
Outside Over There was possibly the deepest dive Sendak ever
took. "It brought on a nervous breakdown of monumental force," he said.
"It slammed me to the ground. I got that close to the fire!"

A true artistic visionary, Sendak will be sorely missed—by both
parents and children for generations to come.